Blog Post

The Science of Star Wars: Fact, Fiction or Something in Between?

April 9, 2019

The Force, lightsabers, AI robots (with a sense of humor), hyperdrive, life on other planets, the Death Star – these phenomena presented in Star Wars have captured the imaginations of millions of moviegoers. We’ve seen nothing like them in the real world.  Might we someday?

On April 3, 2019, Dr. Dirk K. Morr, Professor of Physics at University of Illinois at Chicago, walked a large audience assembled at the Harold Washington Library Center through each of these phenomena and offered his take on how they square with the laws of Science, at least as we understand the scientific principles today.  It was a fascinating presentation, well worth your time to view on C2ST’s YouTube Channel (the presentation included film clips, music and very cool graphics).  Here are a few bottom lines from the program.

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Blog Post

THE POWER OF ONE: How you can make a difference during STEM mentoring month

By Jenny Kopach

Originally published at: https://www.mentoring.org/2018/10/the-power-of-one-how-you-can-make-a-difference-during-stem-mentoring-month/

I just returned from the Million Women Mentors Summit in Washington, D.C., where hundreds of mission-driven leaders from across the country convened to tackle the issue of closing the gender and skills gaps in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM), particularly among women and girls.

The conference theme, “Becoming the Difference,” challenged each and every one of us to find and promote ways to shape the direction of a young person’s life. While 71% of today’s jobs require STEM skills, only 15% of girls (and 44% of boys) plan to pursue a career in STEM. But the power of one mentor can be the change: more than 75% of girls who have a mentor feel they will be successful pursuing a STEM career. Continue reading “THE POWER OF ONE: How you can make a difference during STEM mentoring month”

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Food Evolution: Advancing the GMO Debate

By Lauren M. Segal

Many question the integrity of science, but few understand how it works.

Dr. Naomi Oreskes, a professor of the History of Science at Harvard University, once said in her Ted Talk, “Why Should we Trust Scientists?”, that “at the end of the day, what science is—what scientific knowledge is, is the consensus of the scientific experts who through this process of organized scrutiny, collective scrutiny have judged the evidence and come to a conclusion about it either yea or nay.”

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Blog Post

You Can’t Cheat Sleep

By Robert Kriss

Dr. Phyllis Zee, Chief of the Sleep Medicine at Northwestern Hospital, warned the audience at Horner Park on Wednesday, August 15, that we cheat sleep at our peril. Dr. Zee’s excellent presentation was the first instance of C2ST’s collaboration with the Chicago Park District in the “Science in the Parks” series. Watch the video here.

Dr. Zee explained that three scientists recently shared the Nobel Prize for Medicine for their work in the early 1980’s identifying the genes and protein molecules that drive our twenty-four-hour biological clocks, often referred to as our “circadian rhythm.” Every cell in our bodies has the clock mechanism, and all these clocks are coordinated by the master clock in our brains. The mechanism interacts with light and dark. It keeps us awake and productive (usually) during the day and early evening, and puts us to sleep at night to rejuvenate our systems for another day.

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